Friday, August 27, 2010

I said to Poetry: "I'm finished
with you."
Having to almost die
before some weird light
comes creeping through
is no fun.

"No thank you, Creation,
no muse need apply.
I'm out for good times--
at the very least,
some painless convention."

Poetry laid back
and played dead
until this morning.
I wasn't sad or anything,
only restless.

Poetry said: "You remember
the desert, and how glad you were
that you have an eye
to see it with? You remember
that, if ever so slightly?"
I said: "I didn't hear that.
Besides, it's five o'clock in the a.m.
I'm not getting up
in the dark
to talk to you."

Poetry said: "But think about the time
you saw the moon
over that small canyon
that you liked so much better
than the grand one--and how suprised you were
that the moonlight was green
and you still had
one good eye
to see it with

Think of that!"

"I'll join the church!" I said,
huffily, turning my face to the wall.
"I'll learn how to pray again!"

"Let me ask you," said Poetry.
"When you pray, what do you think
you'll see?"

Poetry had me.

"There's no paper
in this room," I said.
"And that new pen I bought
makes a funny noise."

I'm no economist and my stint as a reporter at The Wall Street Journal was years back now. But you don't have to be a business expert or a rocket scientist to know when a newspaper byline is total bullshit.

"CEOs tell The Washington Post why they're not hiring: Democrats say we need more stimulus, and Republicans say we need less regulation and lower taxes. But CEOs say the real problem is that they simply don't trust American consumers will open their wallets in the coming years."

Duh.

So the real problem is that Americans aren't spending? Well, folks, Americans aren't spending for good reason. Nearly ten percent of the population has no paycheck, and hasn't for a long time. Another chunk of people are scared shitless that they are going to get pink slips.

How many workers these days think they are immune from the ax? How many households feel secure enough about the economy and their personal future to part freely with cash? Most of us are nursing our aging washing machines along, even when they sound like trucks running uphill. And maybe the dishwasher isn't doing a perfect job getting the glasses to sparkle, but hey, the stuff comes out more or less clean.

Like most economic issues, this one is complicated but simple. Businesses aren't willing to hire until they are convinced that consumer demand for their products is going to grow at a reliable pace. But consumers won't spend for fear they are going to be fired.

Bob Herbert's recent column in The New York Times laid out the nation's dire employment crisis in the starkest terms http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/10/opinion/10herbert.html?_r=2&hp along with Washington's pitifully inadequate response: "The politicians' approach to the jobs crisis has been like passing out umbrellas in a hurricane. Millions are suffering and the entire economy is being undermined, and what are they doing? They're appropriating more and more money for warfare while schizophrenically babbling about balancing the budget."

In the past, government has overcome post-recessionary stalemate by stimulating the economy with work programs. We've had some of those build-roads and fix-parks kinds of programs, but the Republicans are staunch in leading the resistance to any more spending in this vein.

Meanwhile, businesses are flush with cash (according to the Post article.) But what will they do with this cash?

"It used to be the case that when the profits of large American corporations rose, so did their hiring. Not this time. For one thing, many of their profits are coming from overseas. So that's where they're investing and expanding production."

Companies are also using profits to invest in labor-saving technology, which HELLO, means, that they will hire even fewer human laborers down the line.

Oh, and one other thing. Reich says "...corporations are using their pile of money to pay dividends to their shareholders and buy back their own stock -- thereby pushing up share prices."

Lovely. The rich get richer, etc. etc.

So it is. Companies care about one thing, enhancing their bottom line. That's how capitalism works.

Fine, except we're in a mind-boggling economic crisis that isn't going away. Americans aren't going back to work in big enough numbers to make the economy come around.

So why should it come as such a news alert surprise that those same unemployed workers aren't running out to Target and Wal-Mart and The Gap to shop the economy back to health?

Saturday, August 21, 2010

I wake up on the rock hard floor and it is it takes me more than a minute to figure out that I am wrapped in Xandra’s red Navaho blanket and that it scratches at my face but for a minute I’ve got myself convinced that I'm back in 1883 lying on Sister Renata’s narrow bed beneath the crucifix.

I blink and then I see one thick leg of Xandra’s brass bed, the bed I was supposed to sleep in last night and I am a little frightened wondering how the hell I got here on the floor, I’m sure it has something to do with that bottle of white wine I downed on the plane and then the two, yes, two ativan I swallowed, one as the plane did a severe rocking and rolling and nosediving routine somewhere over Kansas. And the second one I took as we started to descend into SFO, that’s the moment I realized for the first time that I had actually left David 3,000 miles behind and the fact I did it sort of blew my mind and not in such a good way either.

I vaguely remember Xandra meeting me outside baggage claim in San Francisco, I remember her saying we should get dinner and I remember thinking I was so tired that I couldn’t hold my head up.

“Oh God, I’m starving, would you mind if we stopped somewhere?” So how could I say no? W hat I should have done was have a strong shot of espresso but instead I had more wine, and by ten p.m. when we were heading down the 101 toward San Jose, the lights along the Bay were like birthday candles all alight, whirling on the dark horizon with the stars bright overhead in the sky.

I don’t remember when, but I fell asleep.

The weird thing about the ativan is how it makes me forget so completely, it takes my memory and turns it into a piece of Swiss cheese. Sometimes it scares me, like the time I went to make a milkshake and I put a spoon in the blender and then I went to peel a banana and I turned on the blender and there went the spoon.

And so much for the blender.

David refers to ativan as “outofit.”

I sit up now, here on Xandra’s floor, and my head is still swimming upstream, and the first thing I realize is how I miss him, really totally miss him in the gut in my legs and in every other part of me I won’t even mention, especially in my heart , I ache and that feeling sets me into a sweat and frenzy.

At that moment the door squeaks open and I see what looks to be a powder blue curtain, which turns out to be Xandra in a chiffon bathrobe. Very sexy, and her dreds are a cloud flying in a million directions.

“Are you awake?” she whispers and I whisper “uh, yes, I guess so.”

She makes her way into the room. “What in God’s name are you doing under the rug?”

I push it away. “I wish I knew,” I mumble, rolling over.

“So I’ve got to get to work early today, but I want you to come with me. I have a friend I want you to see this morning."

"Who is your friend?"

"She is a therapist, but not the sort you've been seeing."

"What sort is she?" I sit up, and I am yawning and so at first when she answers I am not quite sure I hear her right.

"She does hypnosis for past life regression."

I don't answer right away. Finally I say, "I don't think so, Xand."

"Look, Gina, you just have to meet her. She's someone you would like. I work with her now and then and she's amazing. And all you have to do is meet her. You can decide later if you want her services."

I lay back down on the floor and close my eyes. "Right now Xand all I want is more sleep. I don't want to meet anyone. So if you don't mind, I think I'll stay here this morning."

Xandra doesn't say anything at first. Then she sits down on the floor cross-legged and suddenly I realize that she is studying me.

"What?"

"Oh it's just that I was thinking of taking the afternoon off. I thought we could take a walk at this bird sanctuary and talk about what’s going on with you and David.”

"Sure. That sounds great. So you could come back and get me at lunch and I can sleep a few more hours."

"Yes, except if you stay here it means an extra two hours of driving."

I feel trapped. Xandra is pushing me way too hard, and I don't want to be pushed. I am about to say this to Xandra, except she beats me to it.

"Look, Gina, I know I"m putting a bit of a squeeze on you, but I really wish you'd go along with me here. I have a strong intuition that you are going to like this woman. She's helped a lot of people and she's very easy-going."

I am not happy, at all, but I decide that in the interest of keeping peace, I will meet Xandra's friend and get it over with.

I drag myself off the floor and head for the shower, where I stand for an extra few minutes, letting the water soak into my head and neck. Soon I am dressed and in the kitchen, where Xandra hands me one of her green "power" shakes.

"I'll take an English muffin, if you have one," I mumble. Naturally, she doesn't have English muffins.

I take a sip of the power shake and it tastes vaguely like my lawn back home. I place the glass very carefully back on the counter and soon, I'm sitting in Xandra’s BMW, and we are in traffic backed up the 101, and my new life in California, packed like a sardine in a car on the freeway, has begun.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

The movies. Mamacita loved them for the beautiful women, mostly blond, in Hollywood productions dubbed from English to Spanish. The women were sultry, curvaceous, twenty-somethings who, when they weren’t dancing and singing in scanty costumes, were part of the workforce going to the office wearing lovely business attire including gloves and hats.

Even the mothers who stayed home were shapely; they kept house surrounded by shiny appliances that dusted, washed and dried, vacuumed and scrubbed for them. The women wore make-up, dresses, pearl necklaces, high heels and a pleasant demeanor and they were always anxious to listen to their hard-working husbands while handing them refreshing Martinis as they came home from a difficult day at the office.

Mamacita also loved the movies from Argentina and Mexico, full of comedians and beautiful women similar to the ones in the Hollywood movies except that these actresses were mostly brunettes. And the language, Spanish, hadn't being dubbed so it was full of the sound of rich strong consonants.

Alba knows now what the attraction was, the movies were a lovely fantasy, a departure from mamacita’s simple kitchen, rustic by comparison to the American, no shiny appliances. And no chance of anyone in her life ever dancing and singing in scanty costumes or her or any other mother keeping house wearing pearl necklaces and high heels and serving their husbands Martinis. Maybe a glass of wine. Wearing a scanty costume?

Never.

But the movies that mamacita really, really liked best, were those starring Charles Boyer the French actor, Hollywood’s favorite of the moment who was always elegantly dressed, usually in a suit. His hair carefully combed back close to the scalp. He had a suave, elegant, debonair manner. Velvet eyes that practically undressed his leading ladies and caressed them slowly, gently. Somehow those eyes managed that whether or not the ladies were undressed or not.

Alba remembers Boyer best of all. He spoke with his soft French accent, dropping sweet nothings into his ladies' ears or when looking into their eyes, pausing to listen to them like he had all the time in the world and nothing was more important.

After all these years from childhood to adulthood these memories keep flooding Alba. What was it that happened to mamacita? So strong were mamacita's feelings of connection to her suave leading man. Mamacita walked home from the movies, with her eyes shining. Cheeks flushed. A sweet smile on her lips.

Charles Boyer had that effect on her. Alba knows now, because she was in love with him, too.

Camincha was Featured Author at the 2005, 2006 and 2008 Litquake San Francisco Annual Literary Festival. She resides in Pacifica, California.

Saturday, August 07, 2010

What a week it was for hummingbirds. After one of the feeders broke, I noticed about five hummers fighting like mad over the remaining feeder. So I went out and splurged on a brand new --and much bigger-- feeder.

Now they are fighting over the super duper feeder.

I had no idea how territorial hummingbirds could be. They fight a lot, and it isn't just the males defending territory against intruding males. Female hummingbirds apparently defend their nesting territories, too. http://www.rubythroat.org/RTHUTerritorialityMain.html

All I know is that hummingbirds are dive-bombing like crazy through the backyard. Watching them, even when they fight, it's hard not to smile.

Wednesday, August 04, 2010

Five days have passed since my cousin, Tracey, returned to Rugby, England.

This morning, I brewed the coffee she’d bought and sat at a round glass table on my deck where each morning for two weeks she had rolled her cigarettes (or fags, as she called them) while watching my cat hunt sticks and ants.

Although it was drizzling, there’s a spot beneath the boughs of a maple tree, where you can sit even in a steady rain without getting wet. Tracey discovered this, not me. Before she came, my deck was rarely used.

I looked through the boughs toward the sky that looked like gray fleece and listened to the day. Early morning cars injected bass and treble sound into what would have been an otherwise quiet time punctuated only by intermittent chirps of waking birds.

In that spot, I thought about the cousin who had come and gone.

When I left England in 1980, Tracey was one of just a handful of cousins and one of only three girls. She was four years older than me, so she was my big cousin. When I visited her family, she took me swimming–one of my favorite things to do. Yet, I didn’t think much of exchanging her or my other relatives for a life in America, where I’d have only my parents and my younger brother. I thought I’d get Disneyland instead.

Until Tracey visited, I didn’t know that she was missing. I had never looked for her, never put out an APB, never placed an ad or hung a lost flyer on a single telephone pole. In fact, I knew right where I’d left her. And I never thought I would see her again.

When she popped up after all these years, as easy for me as 20-minute ride to the airport, it was like finding something you thought you’d lost or hearing an old song that you used to love that the radio had stopped playing–for me, “Summer Days” from Grease, maybe, the first record I had ever owned.

I left England on a fog-filled day in June. Just the month before, I had turned ten, and my parents gave me a silver cross. On the day that we finished packing, I touched my neck as I habitually did, and the necklace wasn’t there. I cried so hard for it, not because it was so expensive or couldn’t be replaced, but simply because it was the first piece of jewelry that I had ever owned.

Years later, when I was packing to go to boarding school, I found the necklace all bent and tarnished in the corner of a suitcase. I thought it had been missing, but it had been there all along. My mother traded my chain for one of hers with a sturdy lock, so that I would never lose it again, and I immediately put it on.

****

It took a two-week visit from cousin Tracey to force me to step away from the demands of daily life and take a good look at the place I now call home.

Suddenly, after living in the US for 31 years, I became a tourist in my own country.

We visited the usual spots like Lake Placid and went camping for a couple days near Whiteface Mountain. She even had the opportunity to see a bear, which visited our camp -- twice!

The most interesting part of her visit was going to New York City and watching a foreigner take it in for the first time. When we made a list of what she wanted to see, I suggested the usual–Ellis Island, Empire State Building, the World Trade Center site, Times Square.

Her list (and in this order) -- the inside of an American law firm (so she could see if they looked the way they do in American shows on TV), the types of places where "Sex in the City" would take place, the Chrysler Building (apparently this is a must-see as far as the English are concerned) and Times Square.

She did not want to visit the World Trade Center site. She was content to view Lady Liberty from afar, and she was not at all amused by the three-hour time span we spent mostly in lines waiting to get in (and out) of the Empire State Building.

Times Square was to be the big sha-bang, so I saved it until last, the place we would stay until the call of the final train forced us to leave.

We got there at dusk. Men were sitting about playing chess and people were beginning to come in droves. We walked around, and she took what seemed like a hundred photos. Then, within thirty minutes at the most, she suggested that we go back to one of the nice streets we had been walking on to get a coffee or a drink. What’s next, she wanted to know. What was the plan?

I was dumbfounded. There we were in Times Square. Police on every corner (tourists, for some reason always want to take pictures with American cops -- especially the ones on horses). Broadway lights at every turn, the hum of a night yet to unfold, and she wanted to know what was next.

There is no next, I told her. We’re here, where everyone is going. This is it. Final destination. The big sha-bang.

She looked around, unimpressed.

“Reminds me of Blackpool,” she said. Blackpool is a family resort spot in England.

I didn’t expect that I would feel so defensive. After all, I remember years ago when her mixed reactions to America would have been my own. Back then, I too was totally unimpressed. There’s the undeniable beauty of places like upstate New York and then the oversized, crowded, impoverished, violent, gritty, dirty America. Either way, I guess one has to live here to love it here.

There was a moment of silence, and then there was little left to say. I didn’t feel like showing her my America anymore, so we headed back to Grand Central Station and took the next train home.

Lori Cullen's blog appears regularly on the Albany Times Union's blog page. This material appeared first in the blog on August 2 and 3, 2010. Make sure to check out Cullen's wonderful writing at http://blog.timesunion.com/loricullen/

"Take Hold of Seeing Red With Your Hands, Your Fingers..."

August 7, 2011 “…take hold of this book with your fingers, your hands, your arms. It’s that human.Ricci has not only crafted wonderfully-flawed characters, she has brilliantly painted in the scenery around those characters.” Sandy Prisant, Wordsmith Wars.

"You Forget You're Reading, You Just Feel Like You're There!"

"With a book as artfully written as Seeing Red, it only takes a few pages to become immersed in Ronda’s world. For a time you won’t even know you’re reading; you’ll just feel like you’re there."
--Emily Suess, Suess' Pieces, July 22, 2011

Readers Rave About "Seeing Red"

July 7, 2011

“I finished Seeing Red!!! Great book!! You really have a gift for writing such compelling novels. I couldn't put it down. I loved the whole part in Spain. It made me want to move to another country. GREAT JOB!!!!!!!”

– P.M. Woods, author, Spinning Will

July 6, 2011

“I am having the best experience reading your book. I would love to see the bookmade into a movie. You are a genius, you have amazing talent…write more!”--Ruth Horowitz,Boca Raton, Florida

June 27, 2011

“I just finished Seeing Red this a.m.! The last 100 pages of that book fly! Your leading lady, with the help and encouragement of others, allows all her dreams to come true! I like this buoyed up narrative. Even when you discuss traumatic events, within a few pages, you’ve disentangled Ronda, so your reader knows that it’s her inner struggles that cause her the most angst. So in all, a *nourishing* read! I get the feeling this is somehow autobiographical, at least the son, Jack. And your descriptions are so VIVID. I could see everyone and everything. And as I mentioned the other day, your secondary characters are painted so strongly. They’re all wonderful, and I wish I knew them personally.What makes this book so interesting and worthwhile, is that it is all about reaching personal fulfillment and happiness (imagine fiction doing that)! Even in her darkest places, Ronda comes through for herself and others. You’ve given her (and us) a sense of possibility and resolution. Your work reminds us that, despite obstacles (some quite severe) happy, even celebratory, endings are indeed possible! This is perhaps the HAPPIEST novel I’ve ever read! It made me feel good, and as I said, nourished.”

--Nancy Dunlop, Ph.D., Delmar, New York

June 4, 2011

“I finished reading Seeing Red a few days ago. Thank you for a wonderful story! Ronda is a scrappy heroine with whom many of us can identify. She reinvents herself, with some uncertainty, but with determination, too. Her husband is such a jerk! The oily Enrique is thoroughly detestable, too. Leely and Freida are spirited, assertive ladies who refuse to fit a mold. I know I must now read Dreaming Maples. Keep writing Claudia!”

-- Christine McKnight, Schuylerville, N.Y.

June 1, 2011

“Well Claudia I just got done crying, at 12:30 a.m. after finishing Seeing Red. I stayed up late four nights in a row reading Ronda's journey, and out of all it, it was Jack that got me sobbing. I enjoyed Ronda's journey through Spain, the process of her learning to dance, her friends in Spain, the trip in the caves! I love her driver! I love her figuring out (through Leely) that men have dictated so much of what she thinks about herself. I like that she had a lot of doubts, I never trust characters who have a few paragraphs of doubt and then move on, charging ahead. Most of us revisit our doubts a lot. It's part of the process and you conveyed that well. And I really like that her journey had so many detours. It wasn't just “go to Spain, take on a few hurdles, and voila, the results are in.” It was a lot of detours and I like that. I love the part about the shawl and her dancing, so powerful!!! You really conveyed that transition and the power of the shawl very well. (And I believe a light, flowered shawl is symbolic of being wrapped in love.) Also, I love the party! Wow, what a book!!!”